www.themacleodfamily.org

Just a reminder that we’ve moved! There’s a new entry up at our new site at: www.themacleodfamily.org.

We have finally made the official move from www.mel-and-ali.com to www.themacleodfamily.org. Please update your bookmarks and readers as the old site will soon be disappearing!

A big thanks to our friend, Stefanie Noble, for her help in the design work on the new site.

We’ll see you there!

Andrew took some impressive naps today. His first one was three and a half hours! I thought his second nap would consequently be pretty short, but he was still snoozing soundly an hour and a half into it. We had a couple of things to do this evening, plus I wanted to be able to put him to bed at the normal time tonight, so I opened the door to the nursery to hopefully let some light and noise in and help rouse him. Alice, who had been awake for a while, was playing on the landing.

I went to the bathroom and (of course) Andrew woke up and started to cry. I quickly washed my hands, and by the time I made it to the nursery, Alice had beat me there:

Thank you, God, for not sending this tomboy mother two girls.

I’ve been trying to be really good about going running three days a week (honey, if your babies are nine months old, you can’t blame the weight on them anymore), and not letting myself give any excuses. I normally try to go sans children (e.g. before Ali leaves for work in the morning), but that’s not always possible. Like today.

And we woke up to a Rainy Day.

No excuses, though, right? It wasn’t actually raining right after breakfast, and I thought, if I don’t go, it won’t rain, and then I’ll wish I’d gone, so I bundled the kids up, got out the rain covers for the stroller and off we went. It started raining as we left the house, but after spending about 20 minutes to get everybody suited up and loaded, I thought it couldn’t be any worse to try to brave it than to do all that over again.

It POURED. Torrentially. I was soaked by the time we reached the park five minutes from the house. But hey, once you’re soaked, you’re not saving anything by going back, are you? And the babes were snug as bugs under their rain covers. So on we ran, the lone inhabitants of the park on this glorious Thursday morning. Even the park workers were waiting it out in their truck (and watching us).

We got back to the house half an hour later, me so soaked I had to literally wring out my clothes:

(Not the best self portrait, and I’m not even sure you can see how wet I am, but let me tell you that that shirt is actually about four shades lighter than this.)

(You can see the couple of dry spots left below my knees — the rest of my pants were sopping.)

And the babies? Asleep.

I let them sleep in the stroller in the garage while I attempted to dry and warm myself inside. They woke up about half an hour later, full of beans and ready for more:

(Do you like his fangs?)

Of course, by that time, the sun was shining and the pavements were dry again.

Moral of the story: Check the weather forecast.

Each night, we follow the same simple bedtime routine. We sing a song (“Puff the Magic Dragon” — because I know all the words and can hit all the notes) while we put the babies in their sleepsacks, we walk into the nursery and stand by the cribs, we say prayers, and then we put the babies down (When Alasdair is here, we each take a baby, but when he’s not, I obviously have to do them one at a time).

It’s been quite a while since we’ve had any problems at bedtime; the babies know the routine and they generally go right to sleep. Alice, who is not normally very cuddly (she is too BUSY BUSY BUSY), drops her head right onto my shoulder as soon as we walk into the darkened nursery. It is one of the sweetest moments of my day, feeling her downy soft hair against my cheek and her hands wrapped around my neck.

Tonight, I put Andrew down first, and then started Alice’s routine. She was looking around in her busy little way, turning and turning from side to side so she could see everything as we walked up the stairs and stood by the doorway to the nursery, and I decided to do her prayers there so as not to disturb Andrew. As soon as I got out the words “Dear Heavenly Father” — THUNK — her head was on my shoulder.

Tell me my children will be this compliant at bedtime forever.

Andrew:

Weight: 16 lb 8 oz (<5th percentile)
Height: 27 in (10th percentile)
Head Circumference: 46 cm (60th percentile)

Alice:

Weight: 17 lb 6 oz (20th percentile)
Height: 27 in (25th percentile)
Head Circumference: 44 cm (45th percentile)

Army crawling is beneath Alice. She has skipped straight to hands-and-knees crawling.

Once again, we use the remote control as bait, although now that there are two mobile children in the house, the unprotected remote has the effect of honey on flies:

9 months – Alice Crawls! And: Remote Control Wars from Alasdair & Melissa Macleod on Vimeo.

• Apr 12 : Easter duds
• Apr 9 : Milestones
• Apr 6 : Best friends
• Apr 6 : A son’s tribute
• Apr 4 : Happy Easter!